Chapter 8

"Love me?" I felt like I'd just heard the most absurd joke in the world. "If you loved me, would you have taken Lily to see the Northern Lights while I was doubled over with appendicitis?" "If you loved me, would you have left me alone in the emergency room after a highway car crash so you could run off and buy Lily the pastries she was craving?" "If you loved me, would you have killed our child just so hers could have its father's undivided attention?" Daniel's face drained of color, one shade at a time. I didn't stop. "Your so-called love is nothing but an excuse. You want to keep both women in your life so you can prove how important you are. But the truth is, you don't love either of us." "If you loved Lily, you wouldn't have married me while you had her. If you loved me, you wouldn't have touched her while you had me." "The only person you've ever loved is yourself." My voice was quiet, but every word landed like a hammer blow against his eardrums. His face flushed crimson, but he couldn't find a single word to fight back. I didn't give him another chance. I turned and walked into the elevator. When the doors opened, Adam was already waiting outside. The moment he saw me, the tension visibly left his shoulders. "Thank God." I looked at him. "What's wrong?" "I was afraid you'd go back." "Not a chance." The words were out before I even thought about them. Adam held my gaze, his eyes steady and sure. "I know. I believe you." We exchanged a small smile and walked back to the room together. The group that had gone out for late-night food still wasn't back. Adam opened a delivery app and asked me what I wanted to eat. I was about to answer when my phone rang. It was my mother. The second I picked up, she burst into tears. "Emma, your father collapsed. You need to come home right now!" Before I could say a word, Mark snatched the phone away. "Do you have any idea how irresponsible you are? You just disappeared without telling anyone. If it weren't for Daniel, we wouldn't even know you went to Miami. What is wrong with you? You're just going to abandon Mom and Dad?" I kept my voice even. "Don't they still have you?" Mark was clearly caught off guard. "I have a job! I'm saving up to move out and I'm planning a wedding. Where am I supposed to find time to look after them? Besides, it's always been your thing." He was sputtering, too worked up to notice that his own logic had fallen apart. I let out a cold laugh. "Exactly. It's always been me. Which is precisely why it's your turn now. You're their child too. You should be shouldering your share of the responsibility. You can't keep hiding behind work as an excuse." "And for the record, you're not the only one with a job anymore. I have one too." Every time our parents got sick or ended up in the hospital, the call always went straight to me. Whenever I was overwhelmed and asked Mark to pitch in, he refused without a shred of guilt. "You're a housewife. You sit around all day doing nothing. You have no idea how hard it is for the rest of us who actually work. Household stuff is your department. You should be doing more." He called it sharing the load. In reality, the entire load had always been on my shoulders. Now that I had a career of my own, he still wanted to dump it all on me. "You call that a job?" Mark's voice dripped with contempt. "You're miles away from home. Listen to me. Quit. A woman's place is at home, taking care of her husband and her parents. That matters more than anything." All I felt was the irony. "Mark, funny how that's not what you told Lily. You told her a woman absolutely must have her own career, that she should never cut herself off from society. Otherwise even her husband and children would look down on her. Isn't that right?" The other end went silent for a long time. Mark had nothing to say. After a moment, I heard rustling as the phone changed hands. My father came on, his tone uncharacteristically gentle. "Emma, we're getting old. We need you." "I know you're a good girl. You wouldn't just abandon your parents. Every time your mother and I were in the hospital, you took care of everything yourself. Your brother doesn't know what he's doing. He'd only make a mess of it. Just listen to him and come home." Because I had always done it, it should always be mine to do? Because he was useless at it, he got a permanent pass? Thinking back on all those years I had slaved away without complaint under the weight of their so-called family love, I felt nothing but embarrassment for my former self. I said: "Dad, the less practice someone has, the more they need to learn. That's how they'll get better at taking care of you in the future." My father had clearly never heard me talk like this. His tone turned impatient immediately. "Your brother is a man. Men are meant to be out in the world doing important things. You can't ask him to play nursemaid. It'll kill his ambition." I laughed. "Important things? Then he must be making plenty of money. If taking care of people personally is beneath him, he can always hire a home nurse. Don't you think?" My father coughed with anger, unable to get a single word out. I paused, then added: "Oh, and don't you have another daughter? Lily isn't a man, is she? She could take care of you." My father fired back instantly: "That's out of the question!" His voice pitched higher with agitation. "Lily has never set foot in a kitchen or touched cold water in her life. She was born to be taken care of. She can't do that kind of work." I gripped my phone so hard my knuckles went white. Lily was born to be taken care of. And I was born to take care of everyone else. But I was the one who was actually his biological daughter. Why was my life worth less than an adopted child's? The question left my mouth before I could stop it. "Dad, the truth is, I'm the one who was adopted. Aren't I?" My father exploded with rage. "You ungrateful wretch! Even a dog we raised would know to be grateful. We fed you and clothed you for all these years, and you have the nerve to say something like that." "I wish I had never—" I didn't stay to hear the rest. The moment I hung up, my legs felt unsteady beneath me. But once the wave of dizziness passed, something I hadn't felt in a long time rose up in its place. Lightness. Then I blocked every single one of their numbers.